Zulu Gold Slot Machine – Free Play & Review

While Zulu Gold is not that different compared with other slot machines that take us to Africa, its implementation does make a difference, and you’re seeing a much bigger focus on the Zulu people, compared with others. There are still a fair number of wild animals on its reels, so the safari angle is there, but they’ve made sure to add a fair bit of adventure to it as well.

It all starts with the Wild Walker (lion emblem), continues with the Idol Wild, and then images of the Adventurer, Elephants, Rhinos, Buffalo, and eight symbols with tribal African drawings.

Developer

ELK Studios is the company that’s giving us this new slot machine. They have a decent number of games by now, it’s not a new developer, and most of them tend to be of fairly high quality. They’re appreciated, tough it’s not one of the top developers of this industry. Some of their more unique new games include titles like Nitropolis 2 and Night Trax.

How To Play It

It’s going to be a standard betting range, relying on 100 coins, with the total amount used between $0.20 and $100 (coins go up to $1 each).

In exchange, you’re going to discover a slot machine that offers 4096 ways to win, on its 6×4 reels. It will expand further, up to 6×8 reels, where you’d have as many as 262,144 ways active. To form combinations, you need 3 to 6 symbols, on adjacent reels, starting from the left side.

Special Features

Once you manage to form a combination, the slot will drop the winning symbols, and will let others come in. The symbols that remain drop down first, to occupy available positions. The game then adds one extra row at the top of the game area, and gives you additional symbols for the empty locations. The number of ways to win gets a boost at this point.

Wild Walkers are symbols that randomly appear, following symbol drops. They move around the game area, leaving several extra wilds on the reels.

Charged Wilds are symbols that you get to use for up to 3 winning rounds, when they land. They act as substitutes, and their 3 lives are consumed following their participation in new wins.

A standard version of the wild also exists, and it’s a replacement for regular symbols only.

Zulu Stacks are symbols that are stacked, with 2-4 of them involved. They are made out of regular symbols, and they can appear after drops.

Zulu Gold also has the so-called Big symbols, which can occupy up to 4×4 positions on the reels. It’s the regular symbols and the wilds that can land in larger sizes. When they drop, they clear regular-sized symbols, though not the feature triggers.

To gain access to the free drops, with 10 to 25 possible, you will need 3 to 6 bonus symbols forming a combo during regular spins. You can expand the game area here, to as many as 6×8 reels with 262,144 ways, and the starting size goes up as you continue to form new combinations.

An extra feature would be the multiplier, which goes up as you collect these symbols when they land 3+ times.

Maximum Payouts

It’s a game with good rewards, of up to 10,000x the stake, but it’s not going to deliver the usual excellent RTP that we’re used to from some of ELK’s older games. It’s a 95% RTP in this case, in a slot with high volatility.

Summary

Zulu Gold is the sort of game that you can spend a lot of time with, a slot with a good design and a long list of features to explore. I don’t like the 95% RTP though, and it might be enough to keep a lot of experienced players away from it.